I Missed You
by ilovecastiel18
Summary: A different take on how Cas and Dean are reunited after Cas gets chucked out of the empty. Sam is out getting food, and Cas shows up and surprises Dean. Cue the feels. Sam comes back at the end. Destiel if you squint, but mostly just friendship. SEASON 13 SPOILERS! Rated T for mentions of alcoholism and self-hatred.


**Disclaimer:** Supernatural, its plotlines, and its characters are all property of the CW and the show's writers. I probably wouldn't be worth only $7 and a bottle of pop if I was actually involved with the show, so it's really not worth the effort to sue me, even if I would love to actually meet Misha Collins.

 **Summary:** A different take on how Cas and Dean are reunited after Cas gets chucked out of the empty. Sam is out getting food, and Cas shows up and surprises Dean. Cue the feels. Sam comes back at the end. Destiel if you squint, but mostly just friendship. SEASON 13 SPOILERS! Rated T for mentions of alcoholism and self-hatred.

 **A/N:** I really love the whole Cas/Dean friendship, so that's probably going to be the focus of a lot of my Supernatural stories. Review if you like it!

….

I Missed You

….

"What do you want to eat, Dean?" Sam asked at the foot of the stairs.

"I'm not really al that hungry." Dean reached for his open beer and drained half of it in one go.

"…Not hungry? You're always hungry." Sam took his foot off the bottom stair and looked at Dean incredulously.

"Fine, get some burgers if you're so desperate." Dean drained the rest of his bottle and stood up. "I'll be in my room." He left the main room without a backwards glance at Sam, making a pitstop at the kitchen for a case of beer before slamming his bedroom door behind him. He didn't even feel like listening to music, but he did anyway, just to pass the time. As the bass of an old Bon Jovi song thumped in his ears, he drained beer after beer, thinking about all the people he had lost.

His dad was gone. His mom was gone _again._ Bobby was gone. Eileen was gone. Rufus was gone. Kevin was gone. Garth, while still alive, was a werewolf. And, worst of all, Cas was gone. His best friend, dead, because he couldn't protect him. He couldn't save him, no matter how hard he tried.

He drained his seventh beer of the hour as the song switched to "Eye of the Tiger."

….

He couldn't believe his luck. Once again, he had cheated death, able to get back to his best friends and his work on Earth. Cas reached for a payphone before pausing. Should he call Dean right away and let him know he was alive, or surprise him at the bunker? Deciding on the latter, Cas hailed down a truck driving down the road and knocked the driver out so he could make his way to Lebanon, Kansas, and the old Men of Letters bunker that the Winchesters had made their home.

Surprisingly, he was only about three hours away from the bunker, so he would hopefully make it there before sunset, which meant he would have more time with his friends, his family, before they had to go to sleep or work a new case. He just hoped they would be there when he showed up.

Cas's heart sank when he reached the concealed entrance to the bunker, seeing that the Impala wasn't sitting outside. Hoping that, just maybe, Dean had parked it in the garage, Cas turned off the stolen truck and made his way to the door. His heart lifted a little when it opened for him, and he made his way down the stairs into the main room. He didn't see anyone, but the light was on, so he cautiously made his way to Dean's room. Though it wouldn't hurt him, he really didn't feel like being shot for startling one of the boys.

It didn't turn out to be a problem, though, because he encountered no one on the way to Dean's bedroom door. He could hear the clink of bottles and a very gentle thumping coming from behind the door, meaning Dean had his headphones on and was drinking. Great.

Since he knew knocking would do no good, and Dean wouldn't hear him, Cas just gently turned the handle and pushed the door open, walking in on a disturbing sight. Since Dean didn't notice him walk in, he spent a few seconds observing the messy room.

The whole floor was covered in empty beer bottles, and there were blood spots on the wall in a couple places that matched scraps and bruises on Dean's knuckles, meaning he had punched the concrete wall more than once.

Slightly horrified, mostly _for_ Dean, rather than _of_ Dean, Cas raised his voice to get his best friend's attention over the thump of the bass coming from his headphones.

"Dean!' Cas yelled in his gruff, slightly raspy voice.

Normally, Dean would have reached for his gun the instant he realized someone was in his room, but he didn't care anymore. He was also a but buzzed from the beers he had had in the last hour, so, while he did whip around very fast, he didn't reach for anything to defend himself against his intruder. Turns out, he wouldn't need anything anyway.

Dean slowly pulled the headphones off his head, squeezing the button on the cord that would pause his music. The buzz from the copious amounts of alcohol he had consumed was gone, and he slowly stood up off his bed and stared at the man in his doorway in disbelief.

"…Cas?" he whispered. "I must be really drunk…"

"It's me, Dean. Really." Cas swayed a bit in the doorway, not sure if Dean was going to hit him for getting himself killed or hug him because he was finally back.

Dean took a few steps forward, reaching in front of him. Cas forced himself to stay still, hoping that he wasn't about to be punched.

What Dean did, however, broke Cas's heart, not his nose. Dean reached his hand out and touched Cas's shoulder to see if he was really real, one lone tear falling from his eye.

"…Cas?" Once Dean knew that this wasn't his imagination, he lunged forward and wrapped his arms around Cas's shoulders in desperation. Cas hugged him back just as desperately, wrapping his arms around Dean's lower back as tightly as he could without hurting him. Not wanting to ever let go, Dean buried his face in Cas's shoulder. Feeling his best friend's pain, Cas closed his eyes and tried to keep it together. Finally letting his grief and longing get the better of him, Cas buried his head in Dean's shoulder just as Dean had done to his.

Desperate to hold onto his best friend and make sure that this really was real, Dean reached up and tangled one of his hands in Cas's hair, gently holding his head where it was buried in his shoulder. The two unlikely friends, angel and man, stood like that for a long time, desperate to stay in the moment and not have to deal with the pain that they, especially Dean, had felt when he thought that his best friend was gone and never coming back.

"I missed you so much, Cas. I thought you were gone for good. I was a wreck. I can't…I can't even begin to tell you how much you mean to me. Thank you for coming back." Dean whispered. "I didn't want to live anymore. With you and mom gone, and everyone else I've loved and lost, I just didn't want to feel anything. I hated myself for not saving you. I couldn't…I couldn't go on without you. It was too much of a loss."

"I missed you too, Dean. I'm sorry I caused you so much pain." Cas tightened his hold on his best friend. "I love you. You're my best friend, my brother. You, and your brother, will always mean everything to me. I would do anything to be with the two of you."

"I love you too, Cas. Please, don't leave us again. I don't think I could handle this pain another time around."

Eventually, the two men broke apart, Cas reaching up to wipe the tear tracks off Dean's face with his thumb. They would have liked to stand there for a lot longer, but they had heard the door of the bunker open and shut, meaning Sam had returned with the burgers he had gone out for.

Dean grabbed onto Cas's shoulder, steering him out of the room and into the main area of the bunker. Even though Cas knew the way around the place just as well as he did, Dean wanted to keep him close.

"Hey Sam, look who just showed up." Dean called when he walked into the room.

"Cas?" Sam dropped the food bags onto the map table and walked toward the two men. He hugged Cas tightly, but not for nearly as long as Dean had.

"Where were you? How did you make it back? What happened?" Sam started firing off questions at lightning speed.

"Well, it's a long story…" Cas started to explain, but Dean cut him off.

"Give the man some time to breathe, Sam. He just came back from the dead." Dean chastised. "Anyway, I'm starving. Let's eat!"


End file.
